A Ukrainian soldier with the 56th Brigade on the front line of Ukraine’s border with Russia. (Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON: Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin today raised concerns that recent cyberattacks against Ukraine and shelling in the Donbas region could be signs that Russia is ramping up tensions ahead of an invasion.
Speaking this morning at NATO’s headquarters in Brussels, Austin stopped short of attributing either incident to Russia, stating that the intelligence community continues to assess both events.
However, “we’ve said for some time that the Russians might do something like this in order to justify a military conflict,” Austin said, referring to the shelling that occurred in the Donbas region on Thursday.
The recent cyber attacks also appear to be “a play taken out of [Russian President Vladimir Putin’s] playbook,” he added. “We would expect to see, before any attack, we would expect to see cyber attacks, false flag activities…. increasing rhetoric in the information space. And we’re beginning to see more and more of that.”
A couple hours later, President Joe Biden told reporters at the White House that “every indication” the US has at this time points to a Russian invasion of Ukraine, which could happen “within the next several days,” according to a tweet by CNN’s Natasha Bertrand.
Biden to reporters: “Every indication that we have is that they are prepared to go into Ukraine, attack Ukraine.”
Biden also said of an invasion, “My sense is it will happen within the next several days.”
— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) February 17, 2022
Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists in the nation’s Donbas region accused each other of shelling earlier today.
According to CBS, the Russian-backed separatists claimed that Ukraine’s military opened fire on two districts they hold. Ukraine’s government denied the attack and claim that it was the separatists that had shot into government-controlled territory, hitting a kindergarten with a mortar in an attack that caused no casualties.
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On Tuesday, a cyberattack temporarily took down websites for Ukrainian defense agencies and banks. Ukrainian Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov told the press on Wednesday that it was the “the largest [such attack] in the history of Ukraine,” but that it was too early to say what entities were responsible, according to CNN.
These tensions are increasing at the same time Russia says it is backing some of its forces off the Ukrainian border. This week, the Russian defense ministry released a video showing armed vehicles moving out of Crimea. It also announced that tank units would return to their home bases following exercises, according to the Associated Press.
US officials, however, have cast doubt on Russia’s claims.
“That would be good, but we have not yet verified that,” Biden said Tuesday. “We have not yet verified that Russian military units are returning to their home bases. Indeed, our analysts indicate that they remain very much in a threatening position.”
Today, Austin reiterated Biden’s statements that the United States would welcome additional dialogue with Putin, saying that “there’s still time and space for diplomacy to work.”
However, he also noted that Russia has added forces to the 150,000 troops it already has positioned near the border “even in the last couple of days,” and that they are inching closer to Ukraine. While Austin did not provide a number, a senior administration official told multiple media outlets that Russia had deployed an additional 7,000 troops to the region.
Russia has also flown in additional combat and support aircraft, ramped up activities in the Black Sea and has stocked up its blood supplies, Austin said.
“I was a soldier myself not that long ago, and I know firsthand that you don’t do these sorts of things for no reason. And you certainly don’t do them if you’re getting ready to pack up and go home,” he said.
Although Biden has made clear that the US will not deploy combat troops to Ukraine, the US continues to position forces along NATO’s eastern flank.
Austin announced today that Bulgaria has agreed to host a US Army Stryker company, which will be leaving Germany in coming days. US Air Force F-35s arrived in Germany on Wednesday, joining deployments of F-15s to Poland and F-16s to Romania made earlier this month.
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